February doldrums, Pt II

I suppose you've heard I'm giving the commencement address at my alma mater this year. A trip to Cambridge is what the doctor ordered (perhaps not the allergist, but I can cope). I'm not much of an orator. It should be interesting.

I'm trying to keep the culinary mood light amid the snow and gray. I went bird watching today, and despite wearing three pair of socks, I nearly froze. I'm getting old.

What was there to do after that trek but eat lemon bars. Gert made some for the church potluck Sunday and I of course pocked one or five. I ate those for an afternoon snack with a mug of well-steeped Earl Grey. Just the thing.

February doldrums

A young friend the other day pointed me to this mishmash of information about me on the liberal blog site Huffington Post. It came out shortly before my retirement. I enjoyed it, I have to say. But felt a pang of sorrow when I saw slide 5 of the photo show, in which I'm wearing my favorite tie that I have since lost.

Enough of that. Is it just me, or has this winter has been particularly harsh? Bitterest one in recent memory. Can hardly keep the fire stoked. I've been a glutton with the electric blanket.

I've also been eating a lot of tomato soup. And grilled cheese, of course. Plain Campbell's is good for me. You just add a sprig of dill. And then for the grilled cheese, a healthy slab of cheddar on buttered country bread. No substitutions. I'm no cheese snob. Frankly, I don't get cheese. And I never want to.

Yule, yule, yule et al

Well, scratch the post two before this one. I woke up in a seasonal mood yesterday, and it has yet to subside. It is man's prerogative to change his mind, right? (Or does that adage only apply to women? Shame.)

This may be because of the new snow, or the pine boughs I dragged in from outside and hung over the hearth this morning or because Martha brought me half of a cranberry-tangerine coffee cake yesterday leftover from her choir practice — the kind bedecked with the most satisfying cinnamon crumble on top and a generously plush interior. I could eat just the crumble part with a spoon. I try not to.

I'm thinking about being experimental this weekend and trying my hand at a coffee cake of my own, copyright Souter. I brainstormed three possible combinations: almond and chocolate, pear and cardomom, or chocolate pear almond. Which would you choose? I am leaning toward the latter.

A hungry hike

I hike most every day, 8-12 miles in the mountains. It gets more fun and challenging as the air cools; I've perfected the number of long john layers I need to keep warm. Hiking keeps me engaged in the earth. Truly religious.

But today, I forgot to take along my packed sandwich, and it put quite the chink in my plans. I was more than halfway through my hike when I reached in my knapsack for my ham and mustard on rye only to find my binoculars and some antiquated lip balm. I was famished and the disappointment of not having my sandwich seemed to deplete my glycogen stores with all the more expedience. Luckily, always prepared am I, and I was able to subsist on a baggie of raisins I had brought with me another day but hadn't eaten. Those little things powered me through to the end.

However, upon returning home, I immediately gobbled my forgotten sandwich, plus another.

Some new food

My friend told me about this cooking web site called "Epicurious." Clever. Have you heard of it? Anyway, according to a large picture their front page, Christmas is coming. Well, I never. Ho ho ho hum, correct?

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy Christmas. I like walking to midnight mass, I like the smell of a pine bough, I even delight in a jam thumbprint or two at Martha's annual party. But really, just another day. And I could do without a cake shaped like a yule log, which I encountered one year.

But back to this web site, "Epicurious." On it I clicked "Easy Menus" and then "Healthy Winter Dinners" and found a recipe for chive-corn muffins. Health is good, and I thought the recipe sounded good, so I made the muffins. It turns out I didn't have chives, though. And I dislike spicy food, so I omitted the cayenne pepper. So I suppose I just made corn muffins. They turned out well, however, puffed and golden as the recipe predicted.

I'm somewhat embarrassed to admit I ate four good-sized muffins for dinner and two bananas for dessert. Oh, and some chocolate ice cream. I'm not sure how that ended up in my basket at the store this week.

Breakfast in the morning

When I was at Oxford, breakfast wasn't much -- principally greasy meats, beans and white bread. (Strange how English and Southern cuisine are so similar at times. Which is to say, devoid of nutrition.) I'll for the most part eat anything, but beans for breakfast toes the line. It's a bit much. Throws me off.

So I ate a lot of toast there. Toast, for me, is a given, I rarely eat bread raw, so to speak. White toast with butter, rye with cream cheese, wheat with jam. No permutations. I write this with nostalgia because my toaster oven, bless its heart, exploded on me this morning, singing my shirt and filling my kitchen with an acrid smell that has yet to dissipate. So no toast for me. I nearly ate the bread I laid out untoasted, but decided better of it and had a bowl of cereal. Sad but true.

Breakfast in the evening

I had for dinner tonight what my old college pal used to call a "one-skillet deal meal:" Eggs, bacon and potatoes all fried up in the same cast-iron pan, at the same time. If you're feeling particularly raucous, you can break the egg yolks and create a mishmash with the ingredients (I believe in nicer magazines they describe this preparation method as "rustic").

I declined to do the rustic approach tonight. I like to enjoy my food compartmentally, so I split the skillet in thirds with my eye and fried each component as it was.

You might say this breakfast-for-dinner sounds rather uninspired, and I might normally agree with you, but tonight I substituted a yam for a regular potato. Root vegetables, I believe, are a gift; nothing is as splendid as the jeweled yam, cubed and spotted with oil, salt and maple sugar, roasted and then fried to a crisp. Yes, I do not think anything quite compares. Worth keeping your egg yolks intact.

Somewhere in New Hampshire ...

Hello friends, readers and foes: A joyous post-harvest season to you all. I'm back now that apple season has ended and I can focus on my Internet writing again. I had my last Jonagold the other day — it was a bit mealy, signifying that it was time to bring out the woolen blankets and stoke the fire.

The death of apples also means that delicious orange crops are imminent. It is a wonderful thing. I bought five oranges today, early yet, but why not? They were irresistible, stacked just so in a pyramid at the grocery store. Here's a full report: The Sunkist navels are vivid-looking, but the inner fruit is rather pallid and sour. Still, the scent of a citrus peel is enough to make me crave even a vinegary orange. I always peel oranges, never slice. These days, I live for anything that comes in segments. Ah, the life of a retiree.

Day 99, reflection, eats

I looked back at some of my old posts today. It's always good to reflect on things, and how easy the internet makes that.

I'm no champion poster (nor do I claim to be) but I feel as if I've certainly traveled some distance since I first began this blog a mere 99 days ago. July, it appears, was my month of gastronomic/olfactory existentialism. I'm not sure what to make of it, besides chuckling to myself about how powerful that nectarine was.

I may have changed in how I interact with technology, but oddly enough, the one thing that's remained stable in my life during this transitory time is my diet. Quite a comforting notion. Reinforcing this observation, this morning I had oatmeal, for lunch a turkey sandwich and another pork chop for dinner with leftover cucumber sauce. And for dessert, what else but apple mash. I wake to eat and take my eating slow.

Mid-summer foodstuffs

So you may or may not have read a bit about what I've been doing — that should explain my absence to a point. Truth is I've been suffering a bit of arthritis lately, and moving an old man into an old home could motivate a mixture of decay I'm not ready to cope with.

The diet has been good, consistent. Summer berries, tart yogurt, chicken on the barbecue (bought a new grill. Frivolous, sure. Worth it, yes); nothing supremely notable. I do read Gourmet Magazine from time to time — I wish someone would make me these blueberry muffins — and last night I riffed on this recipe to make a delicious and indulgent pork chop.
I subbed provolone for fontina because it was all I had on hand, and it was flavorful to an extreme I was not quite comfortable with. Needless to say I was ready for a good bowl of bran this morning.

Day 74, dinner

Feeling more and more like a lame duck around here ... which is just fine by me. It's a good time to be alive, and also to eat fresh fish (editor's note: I've never been known for my segues).

Hailing from the Northeast, I didn't eat much fish growing up, only the occasional lake trout or cod, usually beer battered or bastardized in some other way. I went to Maine one recent summer and indulged in more than a few lobster rolls, but past that, I'm hardly a Mediterranean dieter, as they say.

My friend Martha, however, is a fishophile (pescaphile?) and is always cooking up some strange and delicious sea creature (it was at her house I first had squid, thrown with baby lettuces, red onion, cilantro and a lemon pepper dressing. To die for).

I've always wanted to master fish preparation, and salmon was on sale at the market so I snatched up a fillet for dinner. Per Martha's advice, I should have grilled it, but I am sans grill (the old Weber finally kicked the bucket) so into the broiler it went. Since preparing the fish didn't turn out to be much of an adventure, I placated my excited nerves by making tzatziki. It turned out to be so scrumptious I nearly ate it all with a spoon before my fillet was cooked.
I suppose I learned my lesson for next time: skip the fish, double the sauce.

Day 66, cherries (what else is there?)

The mark of a good summer is when your weeks come to revolve around the cherry harvest. By nature I am not one to even approach gluttony in my daily habits; I enjoy indulging now and again in small ways (i.e., my predilection for pudding) but no food holds any power over me. Except cherries.

But I think there is more to cherries than the taste and the nutrition. Yesterday, while polishing off a 2 lb. bag of Bing cherries after dinner, as I am wont to do during July's dog days, I thought about how soothing the rhythm of cherry-eating is: Select a cherry, the firmer the better, de-stem it, putting the stems on my tea saucer or, if the environment suits, throwing them into nature, pop in mouth, chew the flesh, omit the pit (again, to tea saucer, off the balcony, out the kitchen/car/office window). Select, de-stem, pop, chew, omit, over and over again. Cherries are indeed some kind of poetry.

Do you like red cherries or white (Rainier) cherries? Either suits me, though I'm partial to the classic variety. At the market, I like to select each cherry by hand, weeding out the ones with imperfections. It can take me 20 minutes to assemble a bag, only to consume it in half that time. Such is life.

Day 57, a link (and some eats)

I found this blog while scouring the Net today: http://obamafoodorama.blogspot.com/

Apparently I'm not the only D.C. food blogger!

I can't speak for the Obamas, but I like home cooking more than restaurant fare. Tonight I made a fantastic pan of buttermilk cornbread (recipe here) to go along with some chili I had stashed in the freezer for a rainy day. No rain today but still wanted the chili. It's a free country, after all.

Day 54, a new supermarket

I tried out a new supermarket this weekend — new for me, at least — Trader Joe's on 25th Street. I was impressed by the prices! Lacking in good produce, though.

I got some great products besides my quotidian staples. There were many interesting things I though about trying, but I ended up with a bag of Australian black licorice, which is delightfully chewy, almond butter (which was the star ingredient in a positively delectable afternoon sandwich with apricot preserves on wheat toast, I'll have to try cashew butter next), a tub of European yogurt and a box of organic corn cereal. I usually don't go out of my way to buy organic, but it looked good and the price was fairly right. Needless to say I had some for dinner and I think the extra 50 cents spent were worth it.

Day 50, a white nectarine

Let it be known that I love food and I love to eat — I think that goes without me typing it on this blog. But there exist occasions on which I become lodged in a "food rut" and eat the same things serially. Why does this happen? Well, I know what I like and I often want the same things again and again. For instance, I love apples, so much so that I eat them when they're out of season. Consequently, I eat subpar apples for at least nine months out of the year. But I trick myself into not minding because I enjoy the fruit so much.

But there comes a point in my months of oft-repititious eating when food consumption becomes less of a sensory experience and more of a stop at a decrepit gas station to refuel the body, so to speak. The turkey and spinach sandwich I ate yesterday lacked thought, character and vigor, but did manage to power me through the afternoon. The apple I had alongside it was not the stuff of legend, but provided me with essential vitamins and minerals. But this is not what food is about.

I was feeling a bit down while having another turkey and spinach sandwich for lunch today. Like a schoolboy, I still look forward to lunchtime and whatever mood-lifting concoction it brings; another halfhearted sandwich was not making my day any better. I was also not eating in anticipation of my dessert, a white nectarine. It's still quite early in the season for these nectarines, but I foolishly bought some a few weeks ago because I was so delighted to see them at the fruit stand. Needless to say, the one I tried then was tasteless and mealy and I shamefully disposed of it after two bites, along with the surplus. But this past weekend, like a moth to a flame, I decided to take another chance on the white nectarine. Thinking conservatively this time, I purchased one.

So there I was yesterday, pitifully munching on my anti-sensory sandwich, preparing for disappointment with my first bite of nectarine. I was positive it was going to be a dud.

But I was wrong.

The nectarine was not perfect. It was yet unripe and hard to the touch (you can see why I feared the worst!). But despite this, its taste was absolutely exquisite — sweet, robust, seasonal. Each bite was rife with pleasure. As its nectar dripped on my clothing, my books and my desk, I praised the arrival of the summer fruit, and the return of my active tastebuds.

Day 48, the summer soup

I've never been one to drink my meals — I find mastication entirely satisfying and necessary for satiety — but I've taken to subsisting on cold summer soups as of late. My heartburn has been giving me trouble and besides sleeping with four pillows under my head and indulging in a Pepto Bismol nightcap, the summer soup is a delicious antidote to my ailment as well as a way to acquire proper nutrition.

Those of us with GERD are aware that spicy and/or fried foods are the first off the diet roster when symptoms flare, followed closely by glorious, luscious tomatoes of all size and color. This means, unfortunately, no gazpacho. But I've found a formidable substitute in cucumber mint soup. I use half of a medium cucumber, a cup of Greek yogurt (I like Fage 2 percent), a tablespoon of chopped mint, crushed ice and salt and pepper to taste. I blend the mix, it takes about two minutes, and then I have a fresh, clean, seasonal meal. Do you have a favorite summer soup I could try?

Day 41, lunch and dinner

I did a real number on the cashew jar this morning and didn't have much of an appetite for my sack lunch, so I had it for an early dinner around four p.m. Today my brown bag contained a thermos of lentil soup (from a can, I confess), a Pink Lady apple (a varietal I've never tried before and picked up by accident — I usually eat Fujis or Galas — it was quite delicious though, nice and tart with an understated crunch) and a peanut butter sandwich on sourdough. I always grind my own peanut butter at the grocery store, it's legions better that way.

I'm about to crack into my pint of coffee Haagen-Daaz to close the day. I wish I had some ice cream cones, but alas.

Day 39, weekend wrap-up

Had a simple weekend, the humdrum sort, which was fine by me. This morning after church I made banana pancakes and went for a walk around the city, completing my regular errands, which today included stops at the market and the barber. I also stopped at a convenience store to replenish my supply of spearmint chewing gum — I can chew up to a pack a day if I'm not mindful.

I spent the rest of the day munching my fresh market goods — local carrots, radishes and strawberries — while rereading an old volume of Tolstoy. For dinner I concocted a garden (kitchen sink) omelette with spinach, tomato, bell pepper and scallion. The trick to a good omelette is not scrimping on the butter. Use a thick pat to coat the frying pan and your omelette will cook up golden and delicious.

I had some more strawberries for dessert. At this point in the season, they're so tender that if you don't eat them all right away, they'll go bad. So I do what I can, which today meant polishing off the carton. I finished off the night with half of a Hershey bar I found in the back of the freezer.

Day 37, breakfast

A secret is that I always have a bag of granola in my desk. I like it perhaps more than the average person. I'll eat virtually any kind of granola: nut and raisin, vanilla almond, cranberry orange, ginger walnut, even — I shudder to admit — coconut macaroon. I like to make my own, too, sometimes coating the mixture in cocoa powder for some additional decadence.

This morning I had bowl of apple cinnamon granola, which I got from the bulk bin at the grocery store. The apple chunks in it are somewhat modest for my liking, but it has a very good crunch. I like to eat granola dry and have fresh fruit on the side — today I had a cocktail of sorts with canteloupe, orange slices and grapes. I also had a generous handful of bing cherries — still fairly expensive this early in the season, but they looked so good at the store last night, I couldn't resist.

Day 35, post-midnight snack

There are times when I am stricken with some mild insomnia, and tonight is one of those nights. There's little worse in an old man's life than being so powerless you cannot even influence your body's dormancy (especially at one in the morning). I've tried different things to abate my sleeplessness — herbal cures when they're on sale, warm milk of every grade and even Tylenol PM, although the feeling (or lack of feeling, rather) I had from the drug the next day was enough to make me want for acute and perpetual alertness.

These days, I don't mess around — about ten years ago I discovered (or rediscovered, really) the one thing that will, without fail, concurrently elevate my serotonin levels and lull my inner child to rest: banana pudding. It's absolutely uncanny how a pot of banana pudding puts me right out. I use Jell-O brand, the kind you make on the stove with some whole milk and maybe a pinch of cinnamon or nutmeg.

I'm off to make a batch right now. Hopefully, come tomorrow morning, my stamina will be suffering from minimal damage — and I can have pudding for breakfast, too.